


The Gritty Sailor Moon Reboot I Always Wanted

by Pomato



Category: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon
Genre: Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-31
Updated: 2014-10-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 13:05:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2230074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pomato/pseuds/Pomato
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Serena is a typical, happy-go-lucky failure of a high school student. That is, until her life is thrown into chaos after a meeting with an opinionated, bossy, and strangely three legged cat, who is filled with lasers and an intense hatred for something called "The Negaverse".</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In The Name Of The Moon

**Author's Note:**

> English names because I lub the dub

_The brilliant white castle sat in the direct centre of the Moon Kingdom. Its surface imbued with light from the layers of moon dust that had decorated it over the years. It was so bright, and so pure, that it was almost invisible in the sun's reflective light._

_Faceless guards stood at every entrance, with large weapons fashioned to their belts and larger weapons held by their sides. Yet the place remained the pure embodiment of serenity._

_The Moon people scattered themselves around the kingdom as they pleased; playing, laughing, and living as they each saw fit. Most gathered around the tiered fountain in the centre of the courtyard; its crescent-shaped stature forever pouring out beautiful and pure crystal water from its spout into the round pool at the bottom._

_A woman in white stood atop the castle balcony. Her mouth turned up in a caring smile as she looked down below at the plains laid out before her. Her pearlescent dress lifted about her in the lack of atmosphere, twisting and turning with the ribbons of shining hair that cascaded down from twin orbs sitting atop either side of her head._

_She carried about herself a sense of calm authority. She was a queen, perhaps, looking over the kingdom she had built, and the people whom she governed._

_Though there was no atmosphere to change; the woman in white was struck with a sense of dread._

_She lifted her gaze to the starry skies above just in time as everything she had known was lost in an instant._

_Tendrils of deep purple shot downwards, twisting around each other in a violent and disorderly array, each crashing into the ground in a plume of lavender moon dust. The Moon people barely had time to scream as the ground about them shook and threw them about like rag dolls. As more tendrils slammed into the land, so did more people become skewered and crushed beneath them, splashing brilliant shades of red that only spread further and further along the land's pristine canvas._

_The woman in white cried and reached out for her people beyond the balcony. Her hand began to glow with blinding mystical power. However, when she went to spend it on the enemies before her, a sharpened tendril pierced her outstretched hand, shooting through the flesh entirely._

_Her cries were drowned out by a familiar laughter that echoed over from above._

_The woman in white gasped and fell to one knee. Falling back, she went to grab a hold of the balcony fence in a feeble attempt to balance herself. The spiked tendril in her hand, however, refused to let her free, embedding itself further through her skin. At the sudden movement, it climbed up and around her arm in quick, haphazard movements until it ultimately slithered around her neck._

_Another woman, one with a head full of fiery red hair and a skin-tight dress of royal purple death, rode down towards the Moon's surface on a wave of entangled violet snakes; her voice still ringing out in a laughter that crawled involuntarily into the ears of everyone unfortunate enough to bear its witness. With a wave of her arm, she lifted the wisp of power that entrapped the woman in white up to level with her own line of sight, locking her into an intense gaze._

_"Berel!" the woman in white hissed through gritted teeth. The blackness tightened around her throat as she spoke._

_"Serenity," purred the other in a much happier tone. Berel wore a wolfish grin on her face, framed by a thin line of glossy black lipstick, "How strange it is to see you so decomposed in front of your guests. Though I must say it's a good look for you; you should try it out more often."_

_"We had...a...truce," choked out Serenity, clawing at the tendril that held her. The white power that had been emitting from her skewered hand turned a darker lavender with each pulse. Its long nails deepened to black as her desperate grips grew weaker and weaker._

_Berel laughed again, louder and crueller than before. "We did! And how I do so love the concept of a truce. All you have to do is agree to it, and suddenly your enemy lets their entire guard down! It really is a fantastic battle strategy._

_“You have to stop believing everything anyone tells you, Serenity. You and your little Moon shitlings are just too easy targets,” she said. “Laughing and playing and dancing all of the time, without a care in the world."_

_Berel tossed her head to one side thoughtfully. "It's like pummelling craters into a crater pummelled planet, with an arsenal of meteors at my disposals. And cannons for arms."_

_Serenity relaxed herself in Berel's grip, locking eyes with her scantily dressed enemy in a calm stare_

_"You're wrong..." she breathed._

_Berel threw back her head and laughed long and loud into the starry abyss above her._

_"Wrong? I know this kingdom. I've watched this kingdom. Literally seconds ago, I watched from above as you all laughed and played and danced."_

_"No, you're...wrong about...something else..."_

_"And what is that? "_

_Despite her struggle to get the words out; a small smile appeared on Serenity's face._

_"I never...believed you."_

_A thunderous mechanical CRUNCH_ _erupted from below. The tips of the castle towers stood just behind the two woman suspended high above the ground. Berel's eyes widened, having a clear view of the tiled roofs as they split open. Each of the towers broke apart and fell away from each other, grinding loudly as they folded back with mechanical precision. The moon dust bricks shifted and folded themselves into order, the fissures between them revealing cogs and gears that shone bright with moonlight power._

_Inside the towers, giant, inset cannons burst upwards, pushing the walls apart further just as they sank into the ground._

_"What?!" shrieked Berel, baring her teeth at the furnished weapons before turning back to Serenity._  
    _"No matter," she growled, lifting her hand beside her in a furious claw; tightening it about an invisible ball just as the tendril about Serenity's neck squeezed tighter as well. The woman in white's eyes widened, and she thrashed about in desperation._

_"Cut off the head," Berel said, her voice growing louder as she competed against the whirring sounds of the cannons powering up from within, "and the body will die. No matter how many weapons it has attached to itself!"_

_"My queen!"_

_Berel lifted her head at the sound, just in time to see two creatures leap from the end of the cannon barrel closest to them. One creature was as black as the sky above, whilst the other camouflaged in its whiteness. Both shot towards the two women. A flourish of white attached itself to Berel's face, sinking its claws into her skin and tearing away at whatever it could reach._

_Berel shrieked and flailed, breaking her concentration. Another, darker flourish landed by Serenity, attacking the tendril; which, in the midst of commotion, had begun to loosen._

_Serenity fell like a feather sucked into a jet engine._

_The first full breath of air she was able to take in, she used to scream as she crashed into the fifth tier of the fountain below, her back arching as it slammed against the tip of the crescent moon stature. Bouncing painfully, she hit each subsequent tier on the way down, feeling less and less with every collision until a crash of bubbles burst about her ears._

_Serenity lay in the pool at the bottom of the fountain, staring up at the water's surface that felt miles above her face. Every part of her body felt numb, her chest the only exception, with her lungs burning for air._

_Serenity thrust an arm upward and with a delicate limpness, grabbed the edge of the fountain with her wounded hand, which had turned a shade of violet as dark as black. She tried to shift her lower half to help herself into a sitting position, but found that no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't move her legs._

_With strength she was sure she couldn't have possessed, she reached her better hand up to meet its splintered sibling on the fountain's edge, and managed to drag herself upwards. It felt like an eternity, but eventually she burst through the crystal water's surface._

_She drew in greedy amounts of air; the screaming pain in her chest dying down to a dull ache with each one. Her senses returned to her all at once._

_The first thing she noticed was the sounds of screaming about her. There were shrieks of terror and innocence that broke her heart, angry battle cries that attempted to bind it back together with pride, and disembodied shrieks of beings from another world that brought tears behind her closed eyes._

_The second thing she noticed was the numbness; and that no matter how many times she breathed in, nor how long she remained sitting in the fountain, she could not feel her legs._

_The third thing was something she noticed only once she had opened her eyes. After clearing the crystal water out of them; she saw that it was not, in fact, crystal water she had blinked out, nor was it what she was sitting in._

_Staring deep at her dress and into the pool around her, Serenity's eyes widened with renewed horror at the sickening deep redness that was staining her skin._

_The woman in red closed her eyes and lifted her head, taking in a deep breath and regaining her composure. When she opened them, she found herself facing the stump of a comrade's neck, collapsed over the edge of the fountain just inches from her fingertips, whose corpse was pouring an impossible amount of blood further into the fountain._

_"No," she whispered._

_She tried to find the strength to pull herself out of the tainted fountain and towards the people who needed her, however, without her legs to carry her, she failed again and again to lift herself out of the nightmare fountain._

_Around her, she could see more bodies of fallen comrades. Those of knights and guards, as well as those of innocent families and faces that were smiling so soon before. Their blood painted the courtyard._

_Not a speck of white remained within the entire kingdom._


	2. No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Serena has a strange meeting with a three-legged cat that she doesn't fully understand. She then has a fairly regular meeting with school that she also does not fully understand.

    Serena's eyes shot open. Sunlight streamed through the small cracks in her curtains, indicating the dawn of a new school day with sadistic pleasure.

    The teenager sat upright; visions of bloodshed still vivid in her mind and the sounds of screams still ringing in her ears from her horrible nightmare.

    The clock radio on her bedside table was going off. A cheerful song crackled through its speakers, fighting to be heard over the sounds of static. Serena turned to face the small chicken-shaped clock and shuddered as she hit the "off" button.

    "Ooough!" She scrunched her eyes shut and shook her head violently. The chicken clock let out a plaintive _cluck_ as she struck it on the head over and over again.

    Serena slung her arms over her face and grumbled loudly. Partly in protest towards the day, but mainly against the insinuation that she was expected to face it after basically being _traumatised._

    The yelling, the fighting, the _fountains of blood._ Why was it that she could never remember any of the nicer dreams she had, no matter how hard she tried; and yet ones like this remained in her head like a gorified brain tattoo?

    The chicken let out another _cluck_. Serena peeked at it again through the gap in her arms; seeing for the first time the time on its chicken clock face.

    What she found flashing in little yellow lights on its black surface was more horrifying than any dream.

    "Crap!" she shrieked, kicking her blankets away from her as she scrambled out of bed. "I'm late! Crap, crap, crap!"

    In her fluster, her legs became caught up in the covers and tripped her up. She let out a startled cry when sent sprawling onto the carpet floor of her bedroom, her face landing buried into the crumpled school uniform she had discarded the day before.

    "Serena?" her mum called from downstairs, "Serena are you up? You're late!"

    "I know!" Serena sang back, her voice shrill with impatience. She untangled herself from her blankets via more kicking, spinning herself about in a hurry and pulling her skirt up over her pyjama pants. "Why didn't you wake me?!"

    "I did," her mum answered, "three times! Each time you said you were getting up!"

    "And you believed me?!" Serena called back, shuffling out of her pyjama pants whilst pulling on the rest of her uniform.

    The blonde teenager caught a glimpse of herself in the full length mirror, propped up just beside her door, and thanked the lords she had left her absurdly long hair in its pigtailed buns from the day before.

    She had worn her hair the same way for as long as she could remember; and in that time it had gained enough shape memory that she barely needed to brush it to keep it neat.

–

    Serena contemplated the wording behind using her nightmare as an excuse for her lateness as she pounded the pedals of her bicycle further towards the ground with every spin of its wheels.

    Despite the horror that refused to leave her mind, there wasn't a single cloud out to compete with the sun that day, and it seemed to shine twice as mockingly bright just to prove it.

    Just before she reached the intersection at the end of her street, Serena hitched up the back of her bike and slammed the break into the handle. The back of the bike flew upward, and the front wheel screamed as it skidded along the asphalt, lining itself up against the alleyway entrance with practised precision.

    Serena continued hammering the bike's pedals, keeping the back wheel spinning in a charge as it hung suspended in the air. Just as the bike was about to skid to a halt, she dropped the back half down again, and the near motorized force behind the charged wheel sent her rocketing down the alleyway.

    The alley walls on either side of the Serena whirled past in a flurry of brown and orange for mere seconds before she shot out the other end, re-emerging in the car park beside the local super market. The bike skidded again as she turned, ready to shoot off towards her middle school down the next couple of blocks.

    Before she could set off, a shriek of laughter caught her attention.

_Her cries were drowned out by a familiar laughter that echoed over from above._

    She let the bike's pedals slow to a halt as she turned to see a trio of boys gathered around, hunched over and looking at something. They continued laughing amongst each other in a way that made Serena’s skin crawl.

    “What d'you think it's being kept on with?”

    “I dare you to pull it off!”

    “Ew! I bet its guts will all fall out!”

    Between them, the boys had created enough of a wall around whatever they were tormenting to keep it from Serena's view.

    “Hey!” she said, hopping off her bike. “What do you think you're doing?!” She let her bike fall to the ground and began to run over.

    The boys, either not having heard her or too determined to ignore her, didn't move. They continued to laugh at poke at whatever it was that had caught their attention. Serena could swear she heard soft meowing coming from the same direction.

    “Hey!” she called out again. At that moment, her foot caught on a stray pebble and she tumbled, crying out in shock and pain as she smacked head-first into the concrete ground.

    “Uuuungh,” she groaned. As she lay on the ground, she could swear she heard a strange whirring noise.

    She lifted her head and looked back over the boys. They were bathed in some kind of red light, emitting from within their little huddle. The three of them had stopped making any kind of noise, and none of them were moving. They looked stunned or frozen somehow, like they were stuck in a kind of trance.

    “H-hey! What're you...doing?” Putting a hand to her head, Serena pushed herself to her feet and kicked off the ground, rushing over to where they stood. The boys turned and bolted before she could reach them, all three of them yelling in terror.

    Behind them, they left a single black cat, sitting patiently in the middle of the car park.

    “God damn it,” Serena grumbled, slowing to a halt as she watched them round a corner and disappear. Her head felt wet, and when she pulled her hand away, she found a small amount of blood on her fingertips.

    “Great, fantastic,” she grumbled, hitching her school bag more securely onto her shoulders. At least she had managed to scare the boys away, somehow. Without another thought, she made her way over to the cat and knelt down beside it.

    “Are you all right there, kitty?” she asked.

    The cat looked up at her and meowed softly. It blinked at her with absurdly wide and absurdly cute kitty eyes, and only then did Serena notice the small, crescent symbol embedded into its forehead.

    More noticeably, the cat only had three legs. The place where the fourth might have been was covered up by some kind of steel plate.

    Furious, Serena turned her head and yelled down the street after the kids. “Who picks on a three legged cat?! You bunch of brats! Didn't your parents ever tell you about morals? Or don't they teach that in _jail_?!

    Serena sighed, rolling her eyes and turning her attention back to the cat. It looked up at her with big, shining eyes and meowed again.

    “Well you're welcome, kitty,” she replied, smiling, “I like your little crescent thingy.” She went to tap the symbol on the cat's forehead, but it quickly shied away before she could reach it.

    “Okay then, I can take a hint,” she replied, retracting her hand and pouting at the cat. “I need to get to school anyway.”

    She put her hands to her knees to push herself back to her feet, only to stop once she noticed the holes in her socks, neatly shredded from her recent tumble. Trickles of blood were seeping through the fabric from her skinned knees, the red standing out strikingly against the pure white. Serena closed her eyes and lifted her head towards the sky with a loud sigh.

    Late _and_ torn up. How was she going to explain this one?

    “Do you think Ms. Haruna will believe me if I tell her I was mugged?” she asked, looking back down at the cat. “I mean, those kids looked pretty vicious, right? And I'm pretty sure at least one of them was packing.”

    The cat looked at her, flicking its attention from Serena's face and her skinned knees. If Serena didn't know better, she'd think the cat was sizing her up.

    With a sideways glance at the feline, Serena hitched her bag on her shoulders again and straightened herself up. “Well kitty, I hate to leave you, but I have a test to fail.”

    Before she turned to collect her bike however, she was struck with a sudden sense of unease. Something still seemed very off about what had just transpired; one thing that she couldn't quite put her finger on.

    The cat meowed.

\--

    “Where've you been?” whispered Molly. Serena's friend had managed to save her a seat beside her, even despite her lateness. Ms. Haruna had let her off with a warning, but Molly wasn't quite as forgiving as all that. “And what's up with your clothes?”

    At the front of the classroom, the class representative was called to Ms. Haruna's desk to pick up a large stack of papers. They took them into their arms and began flicking through them carefully before putting them down onto the students’ desks.

    “Oh, you know,” Serena said, waving a dismissive hand, “my bike chain just wouldn't line up this morning, and then there was all this traffic and this _big_ dust storm, and--”

    “Your clock went off late again, didn't it?”

    “Well if you're going to shut down everything I come up with like that then I mean, why even bother asking?”

    Molly rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the board. “You know, you really do need to get a new one, Serena. Else one of these days they're just gonna to stick up a big ol' sign for you right outside the detention hall. 'Here lives Serena. No canvassers, please'.”

    Serena stuck her tongue out at her friend’s face before turning to the board as well. “Well jokes on you, I didn't even get detention today.”

    At that moment, the class representative slid a sheet of paper onto Serena's desk. She caught a look of smugness on their face, and a single cocked eyebrow as their eyes darted to the red mark on her sheet before they turned and headed off to the next student.

    Serena stared in wide-eyed horror at the piece of paper in front of her. Slowly, she lifted it up to properly see the score in at the top of the page.

    “Maybe I should have asked for that detention after all,” she said, gripping the edges of the page before burying her face into it.

    “Aw, come on Serena, it can't be that bad,” said Molly, “I mean how bad can you really do on a pop quiz?”

    Serena let her head slide down onto her desk whilst keeping the paper in the air. Slowly, she turned it so Molly could see the little number circled in the corner.

    She didn’t even need to look up. She could _hear_ the expression on her friend’s face.

    “I knew I should have copied off of Melvin,” Serena mumbled, lifting her head. Taking a quick look around the rest of the classroom, she frowned. She straightened her back, grabbed on to the top of her chair and turned around to survey the back of the class.

    “Hey, where is that nerdlinger anyway?”

    “Not here,” said Molly. “He wasn't here for the test either. He got thrown out for puttin' hydrochloric acid in that one kid's lunch, remember?”

    “Oh yeah,” Serena said, spinning back around in her chair. “Man, he really couldn't deal with coming in second on that exam. I didn't think they would throw him out for that though.”

    “Well, at first he only got suspended, but then the kid, you know--” Molly made a quick, motion with her thumb across her neck and shrugged sheepishly.

    “Yeesh.” Serena cringed, “Melvin's a weird guy but I never saw him actually going through with something like that.”

    She let out a sigh and lifted her hand to rest her chin in, “Still, he couldn't have waited until next week?”

    “Okay look,” said Molly, “my mum's brought in a whole bunch of this new jewellery to go in the store this week; she also got some cool clocks and stuff. Since yesterday she's being talkin' on and on about how we should have this big sale. How's about you and me head over there after school and see if you can't find something? Maybe a clock that gets you up on time _and_ reminds you when to study?”

    “Har dee har,” Serena said, rolling her eyes. They had barely made the full rotation before she snapped her gaze back to Molly and said with full seriousness, “but do they really have that?” She reached over and took her friend's hand in her own, “because I could really use that.”

    Molly yanked her hand back with a short laugh, “Gawd Serena, you really are hopeless. I said we'll go over there after class and check. Now wouldja pay attention already? Ms. Haruna's trying to teach.”

    “Okay, okay. Anything that keeps me away from home with this time bomb,” she said, tapping at the circled '30' on her test paper.

    She let her head fall down against the desk and sighed in defeat. “Do you have a red pen?” she asked, her voice muffled by the table, “Maybe I can change the three into a nine.”


	3. Consumerist Zombies - Not A Metaphor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Serena and Molly go to the jewellery store. Serena hits on several elderly women.

    Serena rode her bike up beside Molly's as they made their way to the Baker family jewellery store. That was the best thing about living in a small area, all anyone in the town needed was a decent bike or a determined set of walking legs and they could get anything they needed.

    As they rounded another corner, an adorable little store popped into view: a cute little yellow thing crammed neatly between two much larger, grey buildings. The jewellery store was the pride and joy of the Baker family, as shown by the large “Baker's Delights” sign hanging just above the doors.

    It wasn't an easy target to miss usually, though today the girls found it was downright impossible to look anywhere else.

    Molly was the first to notice. She hit the brakes on her bike, prompting Serena to grip both handles and skid to a halt just ahead of her.

    “Hey Molly, what's the--” Serena began to ask, stopping as she followed her friend’s gaze to the front of the store.

    A crowd of people were lining up right up against the glass doors; others were trying to peek in through the windows to see what was happening. The group was so big that even as far away as they were, Serena could hear the loud chatter between them.

    “Holy crap, Molly. What in the heck’s going on here?”

    Molly shrugged, pursing her lips into a tight line. “I told ya, mum's having this big sale, I guess,” she said, not taking her eyes off of the customers. “Sorry Serena, I didn't think this many people would be here right now.”

    More to herself, she said, “I’ve never even _seen_ this many people here before...”

    Serena shrugged in return. “Hey, well, whatever’s in there has to be worth the wait,” she said. “We better get in there before this bunch snatches it all up!”

    Without another word, she hopped off her bike and began jogging it over towards the footpath. Pushing her bike up against the railing, she shrugged her bag off her shoulders and began searching inside for her bike lock.

    Molly grinned at her friend. “Yeah, you're right Serena,” she said, stepping down from her bike and following suit.

-

    The two managed their way around the line and through the front doors. As they stepped through, Serena took in a deep breath, prepared to be hit with the familiar scent of bottled rose petals. Mrs. Baker always made sure to spray the store every morning and afternoon, to keep it smelling fresh and welcoming.

    This time however, she was hit with the overpowering smell of mothballs, old cigarettes and musky perfume. Beside her, an older woman in a dark jacket was looking at her reflection through a small mirror next to a display. She seemed to be checking out how very purple the purple flower-shaped brooch on her chest looked.

    With the amount of people in the store, the place should have been brimming with life. The place was wall-to-wall with people trying on all sorts of pieces and trying to get a glimpse at themselves in any reflective surface they could find. Instead, the place just felt off somehow, Serena couldn't put her finger on it.

    Though most of the people in the store were in the line leading up to the cash register, moving about still meant maneuvring around the crowd a fair bit. On her way to the back of the store, Serena accidentally bumped directly into another girl.

    The girl was about the same age, wore the same uniform, and her eyes were glazed over with the same sort of deadness Serena would expect from someone just finishing a day of school.

    “Oops! Sorry!” Serena cried, stepping back and holding her hands up in defence. The girl on the other hand, didn't react to being hit beyond the slight stumble, and said nothing in return. She continued to say nothing even as she bumped into Molly, who was walking just behind them.

    “Ugh!” Serena scoffed, tugging Molly closer to her as the girl wandered off in a daze, “People are so fucking rude these days.”

    “Geeze, what was her problem?” Molly asked, “It was like she was sleepin' or something!

    “Dazedness is no excuse for lazedness! Er...laziness! In manners!” Serena scrunched up her face at the strange girl's back as she slowly disappeared into the crowd. “Forget about her, Molly, let's keep looking around. I think I saw something over this way that would suit you.”

-

    “Your mum certainly bought a lot of these flower brooches,” Serena said, as the two huddled over another display set. It was filled with an array of the same purple brooch everyone else in the store seemed to have. Now that they had a better look, Serena could see the flower petals were made out of a shining, semi-translucent crystal, one that spiked out at the edges in a neat little pointy circle. They twinkled like diamonds in the store's lighting, all of them lined up in the display like that.

    “Yeah, maybe they're a seasonal item or somethin',” replied Molly, “I ain't never seen anythin' like 'em before though.”

    “They're gorgeous,” Serena said, reaching out to pick one of the brooches up.

    Her fingers were hovering just above the crystal flower when Molly tugged back on her shoulder.

    “Serena,” she said, looking around at the people standing in the crowd. “Don'tcha think it's awfully quiet in here?”

    Serena paused for a beat, pulled her hand back and furrowed her brow. The feeling of unease that she had experienced after walking into the store came back tenfold as she listened out for any noise from the people around. There was the shuffle of feet as the line to the register moved forward, but other than that…

    “Huh, now that you mention it...” she replied in a whisper. After a quick look around the store, she wrapped her arms around herself and shuddered, “Yeah, you're right! How creepy! Do you think something’s going on?”

    She looked over at the people lining up towards the cash register as they shuffled forward again. The line had been moving the whole time they were in there, she was sure of that. At the same time, it hadn't been getting any shorter.

    From the looks of things, everyone was all lining up for the same item, each holding in their hands one of the purple brooches. Serena's brow crinkled further. Suddenly the flowers didn't look so pretty anymore.

    “I'm gonna go ask my mum what's happening,” Molly said, looking over at the cash register. Mrs. Baker usually ran it herself, but for all Serena knew, anyone could have been behind that counter right now. She couldn’t see past the mob of people standing around it.

    “H-hey! Don't leave me over here with the freakaflowers,” Serena whined, keeping her voice to a whisper. She followed closely behind Molly, keeping a paranoid eye on each of the other customers as she shifted around them.

    Serena whimpered as the two of them attempted to push through the customers crowding the register. She looked up to apologise to them, but they barely seemed to notice that either of them were there, let alone the fact that they were pushing in. Some of them put up a little of a fight when either of them got too close to their brooches, but other than that it was like trying to navigate through a cramped mannequin display.

    Serena screamed internally as she breached through the last of them. Slamming her hands down solidly on the counter, she pulled herself forward, finally allowing herself to let out the breath she’d been holding.

    “Mum? Mum!” called Molly, forgetting her whispered voice as she waved a hand in front of Mrs. Baker's face to try and get her attention.

    The people in the store all seemed to have adopted this kind of dead stare and tired expression, all standing around like some kind of horrifying taxidermy experiment. Behind the counter, Molly's mum looked to be the worst of the lot. She smiled at the customers and continued taking pieces of jewellery, charging them, and handing them back in robotic precision. When Serena looked closer however, she could see the dark bags under the woman's glassy eyes, and the shakiness of her hands. Mrs. Baker looked completely exhausted, yet didn't show any signs of letting up soon. Even her papery skin looked to be turning a slight shade of purple.

    One of the purple brooches shined mockingly on her blouse with every small movement she made.

    “Hello girls, can I help you?” Mrs. Baker asked. Her voice sounded nothing like the friendly, welcoming tone she usually greeted them in. The happy, motherly tone that Serena knew was gone, and what was left was drained and unfeeling.

    “Mum, what's going on here?” Molly asked, “What're all these people doin' here?”

    “I told you, we're having a...sale,” she replied, stumbling on the last word. Her eyes fluttered closed, and for a second, it looked like she was about to pass out.

    She handed another broach back over the counter to another customer, then reached behind it and produced two more in front of the girls. “You girls should try these on. They're on special, rare, and...beautiful.”

    Mrs. Baker practically dropped the broaches on the counter, letting them bounce carelessly across the table and spin to a halt at its edge. Serena tugged at her long tails of hair and took a step back – bumping into more customers as she did so.

    “Mum, lemme help you out,” Molly said, waving her hand in front of her mother's face again. She hopped over towards the back of the counter, put her hands on the desk and vaulted over the small door to get inside the little register booth.

    “Here, mum,” she said, gently placing a hand on her mother’s shoulder, “I can take over from here. You gotta go get some rest or somethin', you don't look so great.”

    “Yeah, she's looking kind of purple,” Serena said, before letting out a loud shriek. The hoard of zombie customers that she had backed into grabbed a hold of her arms and began to pull her away from the counter. Some held out the purple crystal broaches in an attempt to attach them to her uniform.

    “Hey! HEY! Let go of meee!” Serena screamed, waving about her arms and kicking her legs. In her frenzy, she managed to elbow an elderly woman in the face, prompting the lady to lose her grip and release her bony fingers. Serena then kicked another, younger woman in the shin while trying to shove the rest away by squirming and twisting her arms and shoulders, making her top half as compact as possible.

    Thrusting herself forward away from the crowd, Serena slammed her hands on the counter and held onto it for dear life. “Molly!” she gasped, reaching her hand across the counter and grabbing at her friend's sleeve, “Molly, we have to get out of here!”

    Just as she was trying to catch her breath, a purple haze began to pour out of the store vents, creating a fog around the very top of the store. The haze quickly began to descend upon them in a deep, purple flurry.

    Serena screamed, covering her mouth with her one free hand. “Come on, Molly, we have to go!” she cried, her voice muffled by her hand as she continued tugging at her friend's sleeve.

    “Alright Serena, I'm coming, just--”

    Molly looked around her mum just as the zombie customers went to grab at Serena again. When they pulled her back, her tugs at Molly's sleeve escalated from eased beckoning to a desperate tug for dear life.

    “Molly! Help!” Serena cried, pulling her hand away from her face, instead using it to slam the shit out of the elderly woman's chin with her elbow over and over again.

    “Mum, come on! We gotta to get out of here!” Molly yelled, shaking her mum by the shoulders less and less gently as the seconds flew by. Mrs. Baker remained completely unresponsive to her daughter's cries, swaying submissively with the force. As she lost consciousness, her head flopped to one side, resting on her shoulder. When it did, Molly was able to fully view her mother's eyes as they rolled right back into her head, until all she could see were the little bits of red in white.

    “Mum!” Molly cried as her mother collapsed out of her daughter's fumbled grasp and hit the floor, hard. Molly dropped to her mother's aid and, in a panic, tried to wake her. All the while, Serena's cries for help became more and more desperate from the other side of the counter.

    Serena kicked and punched at the zombie crowd as they continued to tug at her from all directions. One of the customers pushed one of the freakaflowers into the side of her face, shoving the pin deep into her cheek. Serena screamed and tried to push the woman away. When the flower touched her face, she was overcome with a sense of dizziness, and her eyes grew heavy.

    “Get—get back,” she said wearily, batting her arm at the woman dazedly.

    The thought of having to beat her way out of the hoard suddenly became very trivial and inconvenient in her mind. The flowers weren't all that bad. They were actually kind of pretty. Gorgeous even.

    All she had to do was wear one. Besides, they really did bring out her eyes.

    All at once, the customers around her began to drop, each hitting the floor carelessly as they collectively lost consciousness. The woman who had pressed the broach into Serena's face pulled it away with her, leaving a deep gash on the in Serena’s cheek before falling backwards.

    The second the flower had lost contact with her skin, Serena blinked her eyes rapidly. The weariness began to fade away, and all of her other senses were beginning to return to her. Including pain.

    “Wha—what happen--” Serena started to say, then doubled over and cried out in pain as she clutched at the deep gash in her cheek. “Aaagh! Damn it! Shit, shit, shit! Aaaahhh!” Her eyes welled up with tears as she hopped up and down on the spot, clutching her face.

    “Molly, come _onnnnn_! We have to get out of here! I want to go home!” she cried.

    Molly's wavy, auburn bob popped up from behind the store counter where her mother had collapsed. “Alright Serena, but you gotta help me carry my mum out of here, she's not doin' so great, we gotta get her to a doctor or somethin'.”


	4. Time To Do A Magical Girl Thing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Serena gets naked in the middle of a family-owned jewellery store.

    Mrs. Baker in hand, Molly and Serena made their way through the sea of unconscious bodies as they slowly dragged the older woman’s sleeping body out to the middle of the floor.

    “Shouldn’t we call the cops or an ambulance or something?” Serena asked, lowering Mrs. Baker's arms gently to the floor as she attempted to catch her breath. Carrying Mrs. Baker was one thing, but manoeuvring her around the rest of the sleeping hoard was a lot of hard work.

    Before Molly could answer her, a loud laugh echoed throughout the store, sending a spike of fear through Serena's chest. She froze to the spot.

    “Who...who's there?” she asked.

    Molly knelt protectively by her mother and looked around the ceiling for an answer.

    There was a burst of purple smoke to their right, and the girls screamed. The purple plumes quickly dissipated around an incredibly tall man. He had a head of blond hair, brushed aside into a really stupid hairdo, and was wearing a purple, strangely military-esque uniform.

    It only took seconds for Serena to note that he was not, in fact, very tall at all. Much more interestingly, he was hovering ten feet in the air. His blond locks ended just below the ceiling lights.  
  
    “Well, well, well,” the man said, his arms folded tightly in front of his chest, “imagine my surprise, seeing two, happy and healthy school girls waltzing about in _my_ jewellery store. Is there something I can help you with? Perhaps a nice purple flower?”

    “He's floating!” Serena cried, her wide eyes fixated on the man's shoes.

    Molly shook her head, looking up at the man from over her shoulder. “Listen here, bub! This is me and my mum's store!”

    “Y-yeah!” Serena stepped tentatively forward, placing herself between the man and her friends. “So either buy something or get out!”

    The blond man laughed again, lifting his hand to his chin and stroking an imaginary beard. Serena never understood this action. Why not just grow a beard?

    “Is that so? Well, I'm afraid no one is getting out of here for the moment. Frankly, I'm confused as to how you're still standing. You must have more energy than most.” As he flicked his hair out of his eyes, Serena could swear she saw a small amount of sparkles fly out of his bangs.

    “No matter though, you'll be disposed of in a moment. In case you haven't yet realised, I have quite the little army at my disposal.” The man threw his arms out to his sides, gesturing to the bodies scattered around the store.

    “These deluded humans will do anything I ask of them.”

    Serena's breath caught in her throat as the man closed his eyes and cast a hand over the store. She took a small step back, expecting the bodies of the women to rise up and start attacking her again. Her hand flew to her cheek, which began to sting in anticipation.

    There was a long pause where nothing happened. Serena let out her breath and cautiously looked down at the still unmoving bodies lying around on the floor.

    The man opened an eye and peeked down at the floor below him. Frowning, he folded his arms back over his chest.

    “Yeah! Take that!” Serena said, jabbing a finger towards the man, “they're already – uh, well, _sleeping_ , I hope.”

    “Huh,” the man said. “I expected them to last a _little_ longer than that at least. Humans these days have such little energy.”

    “No matter,” he continued, his eyes narrowing back onto the two girls, “I have something far more fun up my sleeve. Say goodbye to your energy, girls.”

    He lifted one hand and waved at the girls, then faded away into nothingness before their very eyes.

    Serena blinked at the empty space.

    “He just...disappeared,” she said.

    She spun around to face Molly and pointed at the spot where the man had been standing. “You saw that too, right?! He was standing right there and then he disappeared!”

    She dropped her arm and looked back at the spot, “I wonder if he was using some kind of hologram? Or maybe lights and a mirror? I saw someone do something like that on TV once--”

    “Serena, let's just get out of here before he comes back,” Molly said, putting her hands around her mother's legs again, “come help me with this, we gotta get her out of here.”

    “Oh! Right!” Serena said, hopping over toward her friend. She stepped around Mrs. Baker's body to where the woman's arms were, ready to pick her back up and carry her the rest of the way to the exit.

    Just as she lifted Mrs. Baker up, she saw something that caused her to let the woman fall immediately back to the ground.

    “Serena, what're you doing?!” yelled Molly, scrambling to let her mother down gently, “You could have--”

    Serena wasn't listening, for on the other side of the store, hovering ten feet in the air, stood a monster.

    The creature's head was rounded at the top and pointed at the bottom. It was relatively human shaped, aside from the fact that it was hovering a few inches above its body. It had no face to speak of; only studded jewels lining up down the centre of its head and around the back. Serena knew this because as she stood there watching it, its head was spinning in slow, vertical rotations.

    Its body was a hollow chest plate, one that cut off just before the stomach. Thin black chains grew out of its sawn off torso, wrapping around each other and connecting the creature to its bedazzled crotch plate and long, pointed legs.

    The creature had no arms; only two large needles that hovered out at arms-length from its torso. The needles shone in the light, particularly as the creature was lifting them high above its bobbing head.

    Serena screamed and fell backwards when the creature dropped down out of the air. It hit the ground like a tonne of bricks, smashing the nearby glass cabinets with the force of its feet slamming into the floor.

    “Did somebody fancy a _piercing_?” the creature shrieked, spinning its needle hands threateningly, “We're having a 90% off sale! Meaning there should only be about 10% of you left by the time I'm through!”

    One of its hands began to spin faster and faster. Serena watched in horror as the needle began to change shape; eventually morphing into an oversized piercing gun.

    The girls screamed in unison as the monster lifted its new weapon. Serena quickly yanked Mrs. Baker up from under her shoulders in an attempt to _get the fuck out_ _of there_. Molly received the message quickly enough and lifted her mother's legs up, all while the whirring of the monster's gun loomed in the near distance.

    They had barely moved a couple of steps when a blast of purple shot out from the piercing gun and slammed into Molly, throwing her across the room and into a shelf by the wall. There was a sickening crash as she broke every one of the shelves, followed by several smaller crashes as each shelved item subsequently fell down on her mangled, unconscious body.

    “Molly!” Serena dropped Mrs. Baker and rushed over to her friend. Before she could get anywhere close, something burning hot slammed into her side. Blurry, nonsensical images of the jewellery store rushed past her vision as she bounced painfully across the ground. When she eventually stopped moving, she was lying face down, inhaling the scent of recently polished floorboards.

    The creature snickered cruelly. “There's nothing I hate more than a goody two shoes! Didn't anyone tell you the untouched canvas look was so two years ago?”

    Serena hissed in pain, turning her head to the side and resting it against the floor, “Didn't anyone tell you that being a jerk is so now?” she said, coughing. “And that it's you? You're the j--”

    She was cut off by the sound of breaking glass at the store’s entrance.

    Serena was struggling to move. Her side hurt like hell, and everything else hurt only slightly less in comparison. With some immense effort, she managed to just barely lift her head.

    Standing just in front of a large, broken window, was a very familiar looking, very three legged, black cat.

    “Hey,” Serena said, squinting her eyes at the newcomer. Shaking her head, Serena pushed herself up with trembling arms and began waving the cat away, “Hey! Get out of here kitty! Go get help!”

    The strange creature spun its head around thrice before landing its gaze on the shattered window, spotting the cat standing just in front of it – its single front knee bent and its back arched in an attack pose.

    The creature quickly threw its head back and let out an ear-splitting laugh. “A three legged cat?! Is that what they send to stop me?!”

    As the creature flourished its weapon-hands, they morphed back into identical giant needles that shone threateningly as it lifted them high above its head. “Well then, why don't I go ahead and even that out for you?”

    In a flash, the creature brought its arms crashing down against where the cat stood, piercing them through the floor. Serena covered her face as best she could as the tiles exploded in a cloud of dust.

 _Oh God. Oh God oh God oh God,_ she pleaded in her head, scrunching her eyes shut as she let out a series of coughs. _That poor cat! It didn't do anything wrong! Oh God, please be okay!_

    After the dust had settled, Serena peeked over the arm covering her face and looked around frantically for any sign of the black feline.

    “I thought I could smell some Nega-trash in here,” a cool, female voice called out from the other side of the room. Serena quickly turned her attention over, only to find the same cat sitting patiently on top of the store counter. “But really,” said the cat, cocking its head to one side, “a jewellery store? Not entirely imaginative if you ask me.”

    Serena's eyes shot open. She pushed at the floor with both hands and scrambled backward, bringing her legs out in front and pushing her back up against a glass case behind her. “CATS DON’T TALK,” she shrieked.

    The creature spun around, snarling, “Here kitty, kitty! It'll only hurt for a second!” As it jolted forwards, its head rolled around vertically a good 720 degrees before setting its eyes firmly on the cat. “Piercings are all the rage these days; all the cool cats are getting them. How about a nice sparkly one through your _throat?!”_

    It pulled its needle arms backwards, then thrust them forward at the cat.

    Without flinching, the cat leapt out the way, landing neatly just beside Serena's feet. “I'm afraid you're going to have to do much better than that,” it told the creature, looking back over its shoulder at the beast and flicking the tip of its tail in anticipation.

    As Serena watched, the metal plate covering up the cat's missing limb slid to one side. Inside, she could see gears and other mechanisms working together with a strange white light. It felt rude to stare at the cat's innards, but at the same time, the whole thing was too bizarre to not look.

    In just a few seconds, the cat replaced its missing limb with a fully functioning, white and silver bionic leg.

    “Cat, can you _stop doing things_ , I am _freaking out!”_ Serena shrieked, pushing herself further back against the glass case.

    The cat turned its head sharply to face Serena. “Oh bugger,” it said, “how long have you been there?”

    Serena gripped the cabinet behind her tightly, believing it to be the only thing holding her up at the moment. “TOO LONG,” she replied, trying to get a handle on the volume of her voice. “Too, too, too long.”

    “Hang on a minute, you're that girl from earlier, aren't you?” The cat quickly leapt out of the way of another attack. Serena screamed again as the oversized needles butchered the floor tiles just a few feet away from her.

    She drew in quick breaths, whimpering quietly as the creature turned to find the cat again. “Yup...”she squeaked, blinking back tears of terror, “yup, that's me, Serena.”

    Molly was a little ways off, unconscious underneath a pile of broken wood and jewellery boxes. Serena could see her just out of the corner of her eye. If she was careful, she might be able to get her friend out of her while the monster and the cat were still distracted. Slowly, she began to inch her way around the cabinet and along the wall.

    “Well Serena,” said the cat, dodging out of the way of another attack, “what you're experiencing now is just a very bad dream. Just try and stick it out until you wake up.”

    “Yeah,” Serena replied, her voice pitched upwards in fear, “yeah, I'm not. I'm really not. I mean, a dream would be really nice and everything, but no.” She gave the cat a quick, sheepish shrug, “Thanks for trying and everything though, talking cat.”

    “My name is Luna.”

    “Okay, Luna.”

    The creature spun around again, its floating head shooting around in all directions to find the cat. “Agh! Where did you go?! Is the kitty too scared to fight back?! Quit jumping around!”

    “Or I'll just have to find a less mobile target,” it screeched, whirling around. Serena froze in place, expecting the monster to hone in on her at any moment. But the monster didn't stop spinning at her. By the time it had stopped, it was staring directly at Molly.

    “Time for you to get _pinned down!”_ it cried, lifting its hands high above its head once more, “With pins!”

    “No!” shouted Serena. She pushed herself away from the wall and towards Molly. She leapt in front of her friend, standing between Molly and the creature with her arms outstretched and her eyes scrunched shut.

 _Goodbye Mum, Dad,_ she thought to herself. _Goodbye Molly. Goodbye Andrew, goodbye video games. Goodbye crappy test score. At least I never had to hand you in._

    Serena expected the blow to be over in an instant; but the feeling of crushing pain never arrived. Instead, she could hear the creature shrieking in rage.

    She cautiously opened one eye to see what was happening.

    Evidently, just as the creature was midway through its attack, Luna had leaped through the air and landed on its head, and was now relentlessly pummelling the monster's non-face with her bionic leg.

    It was an impressive feat, considering the monster was spinning its head around all angles the entire time to try and shake her off.

    “Here!” cried Luna, her voice faltering with the degree to which she was being thrown around. Serena could just barely make out the cat's bionic leg shifting and packing itself back inside her cat body. As quickly as it disappeared, it folded back out, producing with it what looked like a small, golden circle.

    “Take this!” she shouted, hurling the circle towards Serena. Serena yelped and fumbled to catch it.

    After securing it, Serena turned the thing over in her hand. On closer inspection, the golden circle turned out to be a small badge. There was a small pink circle on one side of the cover, with an embossed crescent moon curving around it on the other side.

    “Put it on!” cried Luna, “Then put your hand in the air and shout, 'Moon Prism Power!'”

    The monster leapt backwards and collided with the far wall, hard enough for Luna to lose her grip and fall. On the way down, the monster swung its needle arm and whacked her into the sliding doors at the front of the store.

    The cat crashed into them and fell to the floor. After a pause, there was a small  _ding_ , and the doors opened up behind her.

    “Luna!” Serena cried. She reached out for the cat, but couldn't leave her spot for fear that the monster might go after Molly next.

    She slowly turned her head to face the faceless monster with furious eyes.

    “Moon...” she said, narrowing her eyes at the beast as it turned and slowly began to advance on her.

    “Prism...” Without once breaking eye contact with the beast, she single-handedly fastened the badge to the bow on her uniform.

    She gripped the badge tightly as the monster drew ever closer. On the final word, she thrust her hand into the air and shouted:

    “Power!”

    Music erupted around her from all directions. Colours were blaring from behind her closed eyelids. She quickly opened them, and found herself in a world of mostly blues and purples, with a small amount of other colours showing up in selective cameos.

    It took her a moment to realise that the colours weren't the ones that were swirling around her; but that it was she who was spinning on the spot. Her long tails of hair flew out around her, twisting and twirling as she span.

    A deep sense of calm and grace filled her from within. Any of the pain that she had been feeling previously was gone. Instead, she found herself feeling oddly comfortable.

    Was she...naked?

    Looking down at her body, she noted that her clothes were, yes, gone. She also noted that all of her skin was missing, and that it had been replaced by some kind of swirling, cosmic abyss. In any other situation, this would have caused her intense amounts of distress; here, everything had a sort of deep-seated rightness about it.

    The badge was the only thing still sitting neatly on her chest. At that moment, a multitude of red ribbons burst forth from it and began to wrap themselves around her body. It felt like being wrapped up in the finest silk the world had to offer. Or what she imagined some kind of fancy Egyptian cotton would feel like.

    In a flash, the red ribbons turned to white, forming a leotard that covered her entire torso. The badge still sat on her chest, only now with a tied red ribbon protruding from it.

    Her arms, moving through no conscious action of her own, folded themselves over at the wrists just in front of her forehead. In a flash, the ribbons enveloped them, transforming into beautiful red gloves that covered her arms just up to the elbow.

    Her legs were next, each wrapping up into knee high boots, more comfortable than any type of shoe she had ever worn. A blue skirt, much like the one she wore for school, spun itself around her, attaching itself to the sailor leotard.

    At that moment, she felt something cool and metallic materialise around her forehead. It felt perfectly natural sitting just beneath her fringe, as though it had been there her entire life. The metal…whatever it was filled her with a real sense of power.

    The music around her grew to an epic climax, before disappearing altogether. Serena found herself back in the jewellery store in her new get up. The monster before her was frozen to the spot and, though it had no face, she could swear it looked dumbfounded.

    Brimming with new found confidence, Serena lifted both arms and pointed at the creature through the crook in her elbow.

    “I am Sailor Moon!” she shouted, the words building up inside of her from nowhere, “The champion of justice!”

    She threw her hands down by her sides and saddled the monster with a deadly glare.

_“And I'm about to fuck you up.”_

    The monster's head rolled around as it leaned back and let out a piercing laugh. “You think your shitty wardrobe change can stop me?! You don't even look that different!” It lifted its arms once more and brought them crashing down on the blonde teenager.

    Serena grabbed Molly and dove out of the way. She skidded across the ground to a slow halt and watched in horror as the monster's needles demolished what was left of the shelf.  
  
    Her confidence deflated like a balloon in a needle factory. She wrapped her arms around her head with a yelp, and cried out, “I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! Help! _Luna!”_

    Luna lifted herself up on her bionic leg alone, wincing as her other legs slowly joined in the attempt to stand herself up properly. “The tiara! Throw your tiara at it!”

    “AAAH!” Serena screamed, grabbing Molly and dodging another attack. “Luna, help! _Luna!”_

    “ _THROW YOUR GODDAMN TIARA AT IT!”_

    “ _WHAT TIARA? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?”_ Serena put a hand to the top of her head and began searching wildly for any form of tiara sitting on it.

 _Wait,_ she told herself, her eyes widening in realisation. The metal...thing! The thing on her forehead! Duh!

    As the monster lifted its arms a third time, Serena quickly pushed herself to her feet. With gloved fingertips, she felt around behind her fringe for the metallic V-shaped tiara sitting on her head. As she lifted it away from her, time seemed to slow down. The jewellery store around her faded away, returning back to the blues and purples that swirled around her vision.

    She had miles of space around her in every direction. Enough, she noted, to build the momentum needed to hurl the tiara at the monster with full force.

    She held the tiara out at arms-length, lining up her shot where she knew the creature stood. The tiara began to glow brightly as she pulled it back.

    “Moon...tiara...” she said, the words finding her mouth before she even had time to think of them.

    “Magic!” she yelled, throwing the tiara forward and sending it flying towards the creature. The jewellery store was back once again, and when she looked now, flying between her and the monster, the thing looked much more like a disc than it ever did a tiara.

    The glowing white disc left a trail of golden sparkles before colliding into the beast. It had barely touched the creature’s black chained stomach when it let out a scream of pain.

    The creature’s anguish seemed to go on forever as parts of it began to fall away into gold dust, its shrieks reverberating through Serena's chest until its head finally fell.

    When the attack was over, all that was left was a golden tiara sitting atop a pile of dust that sifted away between the cracks in the floorboards.


	5. Mission Accomplished! Except Not Really

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mrs. Baker undergoes a somewhat unorthodox make-over. Serena screams at her problems until they disappear.

    “Did it occur to you that when you jumped in front of your friend to save her, you could have just as easily moved her body out of the creature's path?” Luna asked as Serena tried to slowly coax her friend back into consciousness.

    Serena pursed her lips and nodded, clicking her gloved fingers in front of Molly’s face. “It did, yeah. Like thirty seconds afterwards.”

    She stumbled back as Molly let out a groan.

    “Molly!” Serena exclaimed as her friend’s eyes flickered open behind her auburn fringe.

    “Wh...what happened?” Molly asked, pushing herself up into a seated position. She put a hand to her head as she looked up. When her eyes fell on Serena, she paused.

    “Who...who are you?” she asked.

    Serena's eyes widened. She turned to Luna, crying, “Luna! Molly has amnesia! What do we do?”

    Luna meowed in response, leaping up onto Serena's shoulders. “You're Sailor Moon right now,” she whispered in the girl’s ear. “She doesn't recognise you.”

    “Oh, right,” Serena said, turning back to Molly.

    Molly put a hand to her brow as she shook her head. She narrowed her eyes at the floor, as though trying to remember something.

    “A monster...” Molly said slowly, lifting her head back up. “There was a monster! What happened to it?”

    Serena let out an awkward cough and quickly shrugged her shoulders, “Monster? What monster? No monsters here. You were just, uh, experiencing a very bad dream,” she said with a tight smile and nod. Luna dug her claws a little into her shoulder.

    “Mum!” Molly announced suddenly, stumbling to her feet. She pushed past Serena and dashed over to where her mother lay on the ground.

    Serena huffed. “Well it's nice to know where her priorities are,” she said, getting to her feet.

    “Well, it is her mother, isn't it?” Luna whispered in her ear.

    “I could be dead for all she knows!”

    Serena walked up behind Molly, who was kneeling down beside Mrs. Baker and gently rocking her shoulder.

    “Mum,” she said quietly, giving the shoulder an extra push before returning to more rocking. “Mum?”

    Luna leaned forward from Serena's shoulder for a better look at Mrs. Baker. “Is she...?”

    Serena lifted a hand and quickly shushed the cat. She took another step toward Molly.

    “Mum?” Molly said again, bringing her other arm around and grabbing a hold of Mrs. Baker's other shoulder to shake.

    Serena knelt down beside her friend and inspected Mrs. Baker's face. Her eyes were still turned back in to her head, and strands of her hair, once all tied back into the same, neat bun, now hung limply over her face.

    “Mum, come on,” Molly said, her voice cracking in her throat. Tears began to well up in her eyes. Serena felt her face become warm, and prickles of moisture building up behind her own eyes.

    She had to do something. She had to say something to Molly. At the very least, she had to get her out of there and call somebody. Maybe they weren't too late after all, maybe Mrs. Baker had just fallen asleep, or casually slipped into a coma.

    On the other hand, maybe she really was--

    Just as Serena had begun to think the worse, Mrs. Baker jolted awake. The woman unhinged her jaw and drew in gravelly, desperate breaths of air.

    “Mum!” Molly cried, taking her hands away from her mother.

    “She's okay!” cried Serena, letting her head fall back as she let out a gracious sigh. “Thank--”

    “Sailor Moon, get back,” Luna whispered suddenly into her ear.

    “What?” Serena asked, turning to give the cat a look. “Luna, you--”

    “Get back, Sailor Moon! Get Molly and get out of here!” Luna cried, more frantically this time. She began clawing at Serena's shoulders in an attempt to pull her away from Mrs. Baker.

    “Luna, what are you--?” She turned away from Luna, and quickly discovered what it was the cat was talking about.

    Mrs. Baker had begun to twitch violently. Her pupils had returned from inside her head a dark purple colour, unfocused and spinning wildly. Her gasps for air became shorter and more erratic as her chest convulsed, as though actively pumping out the froth that had started to spill out of her mouth.

    “Mum?!” Molly cried, stumbling back and holding her arms up, unsure of what to do.

    “Sailor Moon!” Luna shouted.

    Mrs. Baker let out a short, gargling noise before throwing her head back. There was a horrible _CRACK,_ breaking her neck instantly. Some kind of metal claws shredded the skin on her neck from the inside, and near the base of her throat, two new, glowing eyes appeared.

    With a muffled scream, Serena scrambled to her feet, grabbed Molly, and dashed backwards away from Mrs. Baker's twitchy body.

    “Wait! No! She needs help!” Molly cried.

    The glowing eyes under Mrs. Baker's broken head lifted up, and a new face appeared under her mangled one. A pointed nose poked out from the bottom of her throat, and a horrid, disfigured smile followed.

    Mrs. Baker's back arched, and her corpse lifted up from its core. She rose upwards, her arms and legs hanging limply down. The crazed, demonic head that appeared at the base of her neck had risen fully to replace Mrs. Baker’s own, while her original head flopped around behind it, connected to her body only by her loose, broken neck.

    Its mouth stretched across its face into a mad grin, bearing sharp, yellow-stained shark teeth. A sort of mad giggle escaped its lips as it cocked its, and subsequently Mrs. Baker’s, head to one side. Spindly arms burst out from Mrs. Baker’s back, splattering blood and chunks of flesh onto the wooden floor. Horrible crackling noises rang though the store out as the new, distorted limbs wrapped around her body to the front.

    “Molly, run!” Serena shouted, pulling her friend behind her. “Get out of here! Go!”

    “But…! But…” Molly stammered, staring up in horror at her mother’s mangled corpse.

    “Get out of here!” she shouted again, pushing her friend towards the store’s exit, “I can handle this!”

    Without another word, Molly stumbled over towards the electronic doors and out of Serena’s sight.

    “I uh,” Serena said, looking up at the horrifying monster as it loomed over her, its face ever still an instigator of unmitigated and pant-wetting horror. She turned to Luna, “I… _can_ handle this, right?”

    “Right!” Luna replied, “You’re Sailor Moon now. You have to use your powers to destroy all monsters from the Negaverse!”

    “Another thing, about this Sailor Moon stuff, I don’t really—”

    With a series of sickening cracks and pops, the new creature levitated high into the air. Its back snapped forwards, bending Mrs Baker’s body into a shape less like an L and more like one of those longer, semi L-shaped Tetris blocks. It threw each of its arms outwards, clenching its hands into fists for a beat before unfurling them, revealing each of its fingers as large, very pointy knives.

    With a small tilt of its head, it brought the knives crashing down on Serena, who only barely managed to dive out of the way in time.

    “There’s no time for that!” Luna announced, “Just destroy it already! Throw your tiara at it!”

    “Right, right!” said Serena, lifting her hand to her forehead. She tapped at it twice, feeling around the top of her head with her fingertips for any sign of her weapon only to find bare skin.

    “Luna, I can’t—wait!” she said, turning her head sharply to look at the pile of dust on the floor, her tiara sitting patiently on top.

    Only one thing stood in the way of Serena and her lone weapon, and it was readying its knife-fingers for another attack.

    “Shit!” As Serena went to dash backwards and out of range, she stumbled. She let out a cry of shock as she fell down, landing hard on her backside.

    The monster rotated Mrs. Baker’s shoulders casually, floating over to where Serena lay on the ground. Serena went to scramble backwards, but hit a snag in the small pile of unconscious zombie customer bodies. She glanced back at them for a fraction of a second, then quickly focused her attention back on the monster.

    “That’s not really Mrs. Baker, right?” she whimpered as it drew closer. “There’s—there’s gotta be a way we can save her…right?”

    The second she had finished her sentence, the monster jolted forward, thrusting its face into hers. It turned its head curiously, it’s mouth fixed into the same disfigured grin. Serena cried out and fell back in shock, landing amongst the bodies. She looked around herself in horror at the people lying on the ground, trying to avoid touching them in any way she could. When she lifted her head and looked back up at the monster however, she immediately threw aside that way of thinking and began shoving the bodies away from her.

    Rather than attack her, the monster flung its head downwards. The next thing Serena knew, she was inches away from the limp, dead face of the original Mrs. Baker, her expression frozen into distorted anguish.

    Serena couldn’t help herself. She screamed. The deceased Mrs. Baker stared at her, her sunken eyes forever unfocused and frozen in terror. The skin around the woman’s open mouth had begun to turn a deep purple that was gradually spreading to the rest of her face.

    Serena clutched at the sides of her own head with her hands and screamed high and loud. She wanted to scrunch her eyes shut, but for whatever reason, she couldn’t look away.

    The monster, currently swaying mockingly in front of her, suddenly froze in place. As Serena continued to scream, it let out a sound like a confused murmur.

    The image of her best friend’s mother’s deceased face thrust into hers was something Serena couldn’t deal with. The screams didn’t register with her, nor did their effect on the monster.

    The creature floated back a little and began to shake violently. It lifted its real face, letting Mrs. Baker’s fall back behind it. Serena could still see it though. Mrs. Baker’s mangled face was burned into her vision. Even if she closed her eyes now, she would still be able to see that same image, staring back at her.

    The bow on Serena’s uniform started to fray and the strands of red material flew about in a frenzy, as though pumped full of static electricity

    The monster’s glowing eyes flickered madly as its stretched smile began to waver. Its teeth ripped apart from each other, unleashing a roar of pain from deep within its chest. Purple blood oozed out of every pore, spilling out of its nostrils and around its eyes. The shrieks grew louder and louder as the creature thrashed about with its spindly limbs. Serena’s screams continued.

    The creature threw an arm out to Serena, stopping just short in front of her face. The knives dangled inches away from her eyes and nose as the creature shook harder and harder. With another roar of pain, it brought its hand shakily back. Moving like it had lost all control of itself, the creature pulled its hand towards its chest and, with a final whimper, thrust each of the knives through the bottom of its chin and up through its head.

    Purple blood Niagara Falls’d out of the monster’s face and hit the ground with an intense splatter. The monster trembled violently in its final pose for several heartbeats, before exploding into a frenzy of sparkles.

    The death glitter rained down on Serena as she tried valiantly to keep screaming. Her voice had given out on her, leaving her with nothing but silent cries as she watched the annihilation happen before her. Eventually she gave in.

    As she rolled over, gasping for air, Luna walked up beside her.

    “What—what hap…happened?” Serena asked through deep breaths.

    “I have no idea,” replied Luna, staring at the clumps of sparkles and thick, purple blood on the floor. “I should think your screaming somehow… _vaporised_ the monster.”

    She turned to Serena. “Has that ever happened before?”

    “No, Luna,” Serena replied loudly, pushing herself up into a sitting position, “I think I can safely say that _nothing_ like this has ever happened before.”

    She slowly got to her feet and brushed the stray glitter off her new uniform. Without another word, she staggered over to the secondary pile of dust and leaned down to pick up her tiara.

    With the thought that the tiara would bring back the same sense of power it had given her when it first materialised in her transformation, Serena brought it to her head. When she slid the tiara back into place on her forehead, it only felt like cold metal.

    “Was that really Molly’s mum?” she asked quietly. “I mean, I didn’t just…I didn’t just…uh, vaporise—”

    “No,” replied Luna, stalking up beside her.

    “Oh, thank God,” Serena said, letting her head fall back in relief.

    Luna sat down on the ground by Serena’s feet, wrapping her tail around herself. “No, I’m afraid Molly’s mother was long dead when that creature from the Negaverse took over her body.”

    Serena brought her head back down and stared at Luna.

    “D…dead?” she repeated. She turned and dropped to her knees in front of the cat, “But, she can’t be dead! She was just talking to us before! That monster must have just…must have…”

    “I’m so sorry, Serena, but Molly’s mother was filled with too much negative energy for any human to survive on.” Luna bowed her head grimly. “That’s what the Negaverse strives out to do. It takes the living energy from anything it can, replacing it with nothing but emptiness. When something dies from that amount of negative energy, there’s nothing stopping it from turning into one of the creatures you just saw.”

    Serena put her hands to the floor to keep herself from collapsing. They trembled blearily in front of her as her eyes welled up with tears.

    “What…about Molly?” she asked, her voice breaking, “What about…what about all of these people?” She slowly lifted her head to look around at the bodies surrounding them, “Are they…are they gonna…?”

    “Molly’s mother was a special case. As the convener of this store, it’s safe to assume she was under the Negaverse’s influence long before any of these people were in here. After a couple of days’ rest, these people should be just fine. As for your friend, I…I’m not sure what to say.”

    As if on cue, the bodies around them began to stir, each slowly waking up from their slumber. Around them, Serena and Luna could hear vague murmurs of confusion.

    Serena fell back onto her knees and brushed away the tears on her face with her gloved forearm. She vaguely turned her head to look over at the exit, remembering how she had told Molly to leave earlier.

    “What will Molly do, Luna? I mean, who’s going to tell--”

    She stopped mid-sentence when she spotted Molly standing just beside the electronic doors.

    Her heart stopped. Serena never did see her run out of them. The auburn haired girl must have seen the whole thing.

    “Mum…” Molly said, stepping forward.

    Serena was back on her feet. She dodged through all of the customers on the floor and dashed over to her friend to stop her, “Molly, don’t—I”

    Molly shoved her to the side without a word, and continued making her way over to where the creature’s clumped remains were staining the floorboards.

    New tears formed in Serena’s eyes. “Molly, don’t go there!” she said, jogging forward and grabbing her friend by the shoulder.

    Molly yanked herself out of her grip and turned to face Serena with a furious stare. “Don’t touch me!” she shrieked, “I don’t even know you! And you just…you just…!”

    Her fists were shaking by her sides, whether with anger, fear, or some entirely reasonable mix of the two. Serena stood agape, her lip quivering as she stared back at Molly.

    “Molly,” she said, her voice shaking and cracking as she tried to choke down sobs, “I’m…I’m sorry.”

    She brought her arm back and wrapped it around herself along with her other one. She bowed her head deeply.

    “I’m so sorry,” she whispered through the twin tails of long hair covering her face.


	6. So Now You're A Sailor Scout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luna is very knowledgeable about many things.

    Serena stood outside the shop and waited as the blaring sirens grew closer. Through the glass doors she could see Molly bent over, motionless in the middle of the store. Right now she wanted nothing more than to go over to her friend, to say or do something and fix everything.

    As she stared through the glass doors, she caught a glimpse of her reflection staring back at her.

    Her hair was a tangled mess, with random assortments of monster glitter that shone in the daylight. Her once white uniform was now covered in sparkle dust and patches of dark, purple blood. Her skirt was torn, her new boots were scuffed at the knees, and frayed fragments of her bow hung down limply from her earlier scream attack.

    “How is Molly not recognising me in this?” she asked, looking down at her dishevelled uniform and back up at her reflection.

    “What on Earth are you talking about?”

    Serena turned to Luna, sitting primly beside her. “Oh come on, Luna. This is basically my school uniform,” she said, turning back to the doors. “Just with, you know, extra gloves and long boots.”

    She twisted her body to see her skirt from a different angle. “I mean you have to be seeing this, right?” she said, turning around the other way and frowning at her reflection.

    “I’m afraid I don’t have to be seeing anything,” Luna huffed in response, flicking her tail irritably. “Not everybody sees things the same way, you know.”

    Serena let out a short groan and rolled her eyes, dropping her shoulders in exasperation as she turned to face Luna properly. “Luna, it doesn’t really matter how you see things,” she said, gesturing wildly around her clothes with both hands. “Cat vision, colour blind…ness or whatever. This is still _clearly_ my school uniform.”

    “Well,” Luna said, with what was as close to a shrug as she could muster, “you look completely different to me.”

    “Luna.” Serena dropped down to a crouch beside the cat and gave her a blank stare. “The _hair_. Are you telling me I don’t look _anything_ like my usual self?” She prodded the cat with a gloved finger. “I mean, just _look_ at me!”

    Luna turned her head slowly and looked up at Serena. As she did, Serena swore she could hear small mechanical sounds emit from somewhere within the cat. When Luna’s eyes settled on her, they caught the light in a way that made Serena stop in place.

    They didn’t look like any sort of eyes at all, the least of which were cat eyes. They had no pupils in them, and the way they rotated at the ends made them look more like…camera lenses.

    They twisted once more, as though adjusting their focus; Serena heard the mechanical whirring once more, only clearer this time.

    “Hey, uh, Luna,” she said, retracting her hand and resting it on her knee. “Are those…?”

    “These lenses take in all visual information and turn them into a string of numbers, which are then sent it to my brain. Each stimuli gives off its own unique signature, that's how I recognise you. Visually however, you could look like a day old piece of toast for all I know.”

    “Oh.”

    Serena turned away and tugged at her hair, suddenly wishing she hadn’t said anything in the first place.

    “There’s no problem with it,” Luna said, turning back to face the store, “I can see everything I need to see.”

     “Right, yeah, I know,” Serena said, pushing off her knees and getting to her feet.

    They stood in silence for a few beats as Serena stared at Luna’s reflection through the glass. Prying into Luna’s bizarre blindness didn’t exactly feel like the right thing to do right that moment.

    ...Even though she desperately wanted to. What kind of cameras were they? Could they take pictures? Video? How did they fit inside her head?

    She shook her head and turned her attention back to her own dishevelled reflection.

    “So, uh, do you know how I change back?” she asked, not turning to Luna.

    “It’s an adrenaline based thing, really. I can understand if you don’t transform back to your original state in this battle as it is only your first. In any case,” she said, turning to Serena, “if you tap that symbol I gave you earlier, you should transform back easily. I did wonder why you hadn’t earlier.”

    “Though I wouldn’t try it just now if I were you,” she added as Serena went to tap the badge on her chest. The sounds of sirens grew louder as several police cars and ambulances rounded the corner. Plus one fire truck, just for good measure.

    As Serena turned around to look at them, she noticed for the first time all of the people who had gathered to look upon the wreckage. It made a lot of sense, really. Serena had caused a lot of commotion in the store; there was no doubt her screaming and the smashing of the needle monster’s weapons tearing up the walls and the floor would have made a heck of a lot of noise.

    Civilians were pointing at the store. Some were even pointing at Serena and whispering to one another. It was only when the emergency vehicles rocked up to the scene and parked on the street that people started to turn to look at them instead.

    “We should probably get out of here shouldn’t we?” Serena asked, turning to Luna.

    “I should say so,” the cat said. Without another word, Luna bolted down the street and into a nearby alleyway.

    “Luna?! Luna, wait!” Serena cried, making futile grabby hands in Luna’s general direction.

    But the cat had disappeared. While everyone remained distracted by the flashing police lights and ambulances, Serena quickly unlocked her bike from outside the store and sped down the street.

    “Good luck, Molly,” she said quietly, turning over her shoulder for one last glance at the wrecked store before skidding down another road.

\--

    Serena lifted her hand and tapped the badge on her chest. Sure enough, when she pressed the symbol in, her costume disappeared, leaving her in her school uniform as it was just before she had transformed. The transformation back was instantaneous. There was no spinning blue and purple ribbon sequence to speak of this time around.

    She looked at herself in her bedroom mirror and blinked.

    “Ooh, geeze.”

    Her once white school uniform now had a big, black scorch mark where the needle monster had attacked her earlier with the piercing gun. She tapped it gingerly. Thankfully, it didn’t feel as bad as it looked.

    She looked down at her socks. They were still torn up from that morning, though it seemed so long ago now. She sighed and flopped down on her bed.

    The weight of the tiara was gone from her forehead, though the metaphorical weight of responsibility remained. Right now, all of her mind’s efforts were going toward pushing the events from the afternoon away - a task that was difficult enough when there wasn’t a cyborg cat from the same afternoon sitting at the foot of her bed.

    Luna, despite her vision impairment, had found Serena’s house with no problem whatsoever.

    “So, uh, Luna,” Serena said, looking over at the cat. “When you said that today was only my first battle, you didn’t mean that there would be…more battles by any chance, did you?”

    “Why Serena, of course there will be more battles,” Luna said, raising as much of an eyebrow as she could, being a cat. “The creatures from the Negaverse are as numerous as they are deadly. We have to stop them all before they cause massive, widespread damage.”

    “Luna!” Serena whined, bolting upright. “The Negaverse?! More battles? I’m not cut out for this! I’m having a hard enough time with school! Molly’s mum _died_ to-”

    She slapped a hand over her mouth. Turning away from Luna, she pushed herself up off of her bed and stepped back in front of the mirror.

    “I know it’s not the ideal situation, but you are a warrior of the Moon! When you chased those boys away this morning, I did have a vague inkling. There was _something_ about your signature that stood out. Then when you jumped selflessly in front of your friend to save her from that monster, you emitted a different signature. _Sailor Moon’s_ signature.”

    “So, I’m just supposed to go around and, what, stop monsters? Destroy more buildings?” She bent forwards toward the mirror, glancing over at Luna through the reflection. “Luna, saying this isn’t ideal is a _huuuuge_ understatement.”

    “You don’t have to do it alone. You have an army of Sailor scouts at your command.”

    “Really?” Serena’s eyebrows shot up in interest. She spun around, putting her hands against the edge of her drawers and leaning back against them. “Where are they then? Why aren’t _they_ doing this?”

    “Well we haven’t found them yet have we?” Luna said, “They are girls just like you, whose real identities are hidden. Girls who have no memory of ever being Sailor scouts.”

    Serena groaned and turned back to the mirror, “ _Lunaaa_ , that’s the same as there not being any. I have no army. Nothing.”

    She sighed and dropped her shoulders in exasperation. Looking back at her reflection, she took note of the dried blood around the deep scratch in her face.

    “Look what that lady did to my face,” she said, tapping gingerly at the gash in her cheek. “What if this scars?”

    “To that woman's credit, she was filled with negative energy.”

    “But what if it _scars_ , Luna?”

    Luna scoffed, rolling her bionic eyes. “Oh just bloody well put some Bepanthen on it then.”

    Serena took her hand away from her face and turned to glare suspiciously at the cat on her bed.

    “Luna, you're a fucking cat, how the hell do you know what Bepanthen is?”


End file.
